#328

At last year’s Google I/O, Google’s annual developer conference, I had the opportunity to preorder Google Glass. As a huge Google fan and the CEO of a company that focuses 100% on Google, preordering was a no brainer (as it was for pretty much everyone else at the conference). After placing my order, I was handed a small rectangular piece of glass engraved with the number 328 and that was it for 10 months.

Over the next ten months, I read countless articles and heard endless speculation about Glass, but the details were scarce as to when the product would actually be ready for “explorers” (the beta tester group). Finally, after patiently waiting almost a year, I received the following email, which instructed me to set up a fitting appointment and select the desired Glass color. After consulting my wife and team and browsing dozens of photos online, I opted for the original, charcoal.

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Since our founding, it’s been a core mission of BetterCloud’s to spread the word about Google Apps and evangelize for the platform. And after raising a Series A this past January, we’ve stepped up our hiring process, which has led candidates to ask why I’m betting my career and company on Google Apps. This was a question we encountered throughout the fundraising process and I’m sure it’s frequently asked of other ISVs and Google Apps resellers. While I’m obviously biased towards Google Apps, I do wholeheartedly believe the platform will win.

Just three years ago, I was a power Microsoft Exchange and Outlook user and frankly hadn’t considered Google Apps as a serious enterprise platform until I started working at a Google Apps reseller. It took me about a week to get up to speed with Apps and I very quickly realized the value in the platform. Since then, you could say I’ve gone a bit over the top … Read more →

When organizations make the move to Google Apps, they often overlook the importance of user training and change management. Failing to help users transition from a legacy system to Google Apps can be detrimental to your company’s long term success on the Apps platform and can leave employees confused, discouraged and resentful of your transition to the cloud. On the other hand, successful user training programs can have a positive impact on employee productivity, collaboration and adoption of Google Apps.

To help you build a user training program and increase user adoption of Google Apps across the board, we created the following flowchart.

This flowchart was made using Lucidchart.

In honor of Valentine’s Day (and our CEO’s upcoming weekend nuptials), we created our own version of a ‘love quiz.’ Take the test to find out how far you’ve gone with Google and don’t forget to share your score on Google+!

Google Drive provides incredible tools for collaboration in the cloud, but as with any new technology, there are new challenges. To understand these new challenges, we’ve talked to hundreds of FlashPanel customers around the world. We’ve listened to the issues they’ve run into and learned about the kind of visibility and control they need to be effective at managing their domain’s use of Drive. Some customers have told us about their goals of getting rid of Microsoft Office, while others are looking for the ability to monitor and taken action on potential Drive exposures.

Through these conversations and BetterCloud’s own use of Google Drive, we’ve discovered best practices for operating in the application. We hope our learnings enlighten you and encourage your organization to go further with Google Drive.

Follow the decision tree below to gain Google Drive enlightenment.

This decision tree was made using Lucidchart. To find out how we use Lucidchart in other areas of our business, visit … Read more →

Being a Gmail and Google Apps fanatic, I’ve always been intrigued by the concept of Chromebooks and Chrome OS in general. And with every 3 minute reboot of my aging Windows laptop this past spring, I became more tempted to take the plunge and go 100% web with a Chromebook, at least for the large portion of my day when I’m working in Google Apps and not installable software programs. So when the new Samsung 550 Chromebooks came out this past June, I made my case to the bossman that we should order a few of these devices. They’re cheap, and if we’re true Google Apps experts developing for the Google Apps ecosystem, we need at least a basic understanding of how Chromebooks function and are managed in a business environment.

What I didn’t expect, however, is that I’d be using a Chromebook nearly 100% of the time in the months to … Read more →

When Google Talk went down this July, it seemed to some that the world was ending. There were countless articles and hundreds of comments from affected users claiming that the outage was greatly interrupting their everyday interactions with dev teams, coworkers and even their customers and suppliers.

Clearly life without Google Talk is an inconvenience. Millions of people use the chat client to connect via voice, video, which was recently integrated with Google Hangouts, and text.  Along with Gmail and Google Apps, Google Talk is dramatically changing the way people communicate. By obtaining the email address of the person with whom you wish to correspond, the entire spectrum of Google messaging tools instantly becomes available. And when you’ve grown accustomed to having voice, video and chat at your fingertips in your inbox, picking up a phone might seem (and for power Google users, actually is) wholly unnecessary.

The End of Phone Numbers

Between a user’s data enabled mobile device and computer, … Read more →